


don't you know you got what i need

by lavendersgreen



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: F/M, Spin the Bottle
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-19
Updated: 2014-11-19
Packaged: 2018-02-26 06:15:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,880
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2641154
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lavendersgreen/pseuds/lavendersgreen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Clarke figures that at this point playing spin the bottle can hardly hurt group morale.</p>
            </blockquote>





	don't you know you got what i need

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you, Sane, for your incredible grammatical and lyrical prowess!!!! You are a dazzling kindness and I will write you 100 sonnets (all of which I may or may not ask you to edit first).

It’s not Clarke’s idea. The survivors of the 100, splintered off from the Ark’s camp, have been trying to form an actual community; thus far this has mostly meant a lot of poorly structured meetings. But one night, Clarke steps out of her tent into the soft glow of their evening fires and learns that “build a stronger group dynamic” has apparently been reinterpreted to mean “try more makeouts.”  A few people still gathering into the circle glance nervously at her and she shrugs, smiling. She sits down.

It’s not that bad. Like overly friendly handshakes, and everyone laughs a lot. Clarke kisses a girl named Jackie with broad shoulders and a broader grin. She kisses an extremely polite and mildly terrified person called Pip.  

It’s nice, it’s—it’s nice.

And then it’s Clarke’s turn, and she spins the oil can across the dust and gets Bellamy.

Everyone turns to look at him—at her—their heads winging back and forth. There’s a whoop, somewhere in the blackness, and then laughter. Next to Bellamy, Octavia is desperately biting her own mouth trying not to cackle.

Bellamy, of course, is only looking at her. She can’t quite make out his expression, but he is not laughing and his eyes are bright in the darkness, in the firelight. He looks, she supposes, much the way he always looks when he is looking at her.

She doesn’t want him to laugh at her.

He says, “You don’t have to,” which makes Clarke roll her eyes. It’s fine. She thinks this evening is a good thing for their camp, and she was having fun.  She does _remember_ fun. And she’s not going to quit, just to avoid a— possibly uncomfortable— situation with her—with Bellamy. 

“No,” Clarke says, and thank god her voice comes out steady. “I will.” She thinks it might be smart to laugh—to relieve the tension building in her throat and interrupt the _literal crickets chirping_ from the forest around them—but then, she doesn’t want Bellamy to think she’s laughing at him.

He’s sitting partway across the circle, and she shuffles over, the dry earth rough against her knees. He doesn’t move; he’s leaning back on one hand, the other arm propped up against his knee, which he lowers now in a fascinating anticipation of her body in his space. He hasn’t stopped watching her, and Clarke refuses to break first. _I’m fun,_ she thinks furiously, bizarrely.

She is finally in front of him, kneeling in the cradle between his raised knee and extended leg. She can feel everyone’s eyes on them still, but she looks only at Bellamy.

It’s only Bellamy. She trusts him. She might even like him a little, sometimes. He’s her—he’s the person she’s got here. The person she knows how to balance with.  There’s not a word for it, really.

Looking up at Clarke he says, soft just for her, “I can call it off. They’ll just think I’m an asshole. It’s alright.” His offer is probably some part or indication of the unknowable reasons why she trusts him even after seeing him with such bloody hands, doing the things they thought had to be done. After letting him see her do them, as well.  

“No,” she says again. “I don’t mind, really.” She smiles, and his mouth twitches a little.

She catches on that-- _his mouth._ She always thought of Bellamy as having a severe mouth, but he doesn’t, really. It’s only the deep lines around it, and the sharp way it curls sometimes, when he’s looking at her with eyes so heavy and bright.

She leans over him and lifts one hand to the side of his face, her dirty thumb anchored against his cheekbones—just to hold him steady. She doesn’t want to miss. Her fingers brush lightly through the hair at the nape of his neck, under his collar. His skin is warm, his face tipped up to meet hers.

Bellamy is still looking carefully, sharply up at her when he says low, “Kiss me,” and she thinks it’s an order until he finishes—“and I’ll kiss you back.” Something clenches inside her, not sure if he’s made her a threat or a promise. But she thinks about kissing him in front of everyone while he sits like a stone under her, and then she thinks about him kissing her back, and suddenly she can barely meet his gaze.

Clarke nods and lowers her face to his. She closes her eyes, just to keep from looking at him and feeling this funny twisting she can’t name.

She doesn’t miss.

She kisses his closed mouth firmly, for one, two seconds, their noses brushing together. It’s only a kiss. She begins to pull back when nothing else happens—she’s not going to sit there forever, waiting—and his mouth follows hers.

She opens her eyes, startled, to see his finally closed. He looks so sweetly determined, moving forward to keep kissing her, that she feels like she’s trespassing. She closes her eyes again, smiling a little, and his mouth curves against hers back. Which is really not how you kiss at all.

Clarke’s not even conscious of her decision to fix this until she’s already moving purposefully against him, until she’s easing her face down to catch his lower lip between hers. Bellamy’s mouth falls open for her, gentle as a sigh, and then not gentle at all. He keeps his word. He kisses her back.

Their mouths slide together with an appalling and inexplicable urgency. She feels like she’s falling into him; she has to hold his shoulder with her other hand to steady herself. His free hand comes up against her side, almost roughly—almost politely, holding her up, his big hand wrapped around her ribs, thumb curving up underneath her breast.  

Bellamy’s tongue is clever and slick against hers, and her head is rushing, her skin tingling. She is suddenly aware of how touchable they both are, of the air tremulous between their bodies. Her hand is clutching his hair, which curls soft and wild around it. Her heart is clutching inside her, and Clarke knows—she _knows_ — how absurd it is to want to win at kissing.

But she does.

She pulls his head back a little by the hair and he groans soft and low, lets her tug his lower lip between her teeth. His fingers clench against her ribs, pulling her down to him; his thumb brushes the wire of her bra. Their mouths move against each other like no kissing she has done before, like a dance she couldn’t explain, like birdsong twirling up to the dark sky. She can feel the violent thudding of his heart beneath her hand slipping down his chest. She wants to touch more of him.

She is suddenly aware of her body slowly leaning down against him, of Bellamy lowering _his_ body against the ground, of _everyone around them_ , and this is what makes her gather herself and ease back with a few last sipping kisses, still gripping his hair in one fist and bunching up his jacket in the other.

She blinks her eyes open and sees him looking unfocused, looking at her mouth. His own mouth is as heavy and dark as his eyes.

“Okay,” Clarke says, and is horrified to hear her voice gasping out of her.  She pulls herself back onto her knees and backs across the circle again, settles into her old place. She breathes in and out and tries not to look shaken.

Bellamy is looking after her still, one side of his bruised mouth lifting up. She wants to kiss him again. She wants—she doesn’t know what she wants, but she feels it beating inside her, heat flushing through her even this far from the fire.

The game resumes around them with a few laughs and jabs that Clarke doesn’t quite hear, too caught in looking at Bellamy looking at her. Octavia nudges Bellamy to say something, and Bellamy finally turns his face to reply.

She needs to get it together. It’s only Bellamy. The only one always beside her.

The evening doesn’t go on for much longer. Clarke doesn’t kiss anyone else, thank god. Bellamy spins once more and kisses Monty, swiftly and sweetly, kisses him again on the temple after and messes with his hair a little. She feels her heart gaping open about it, about Monty grinning up at Bellamy and Bellamy putting his grouchy face back on. She’s not sure if Bellamy keeps looking at her or if he just keeps noticing her looking at him. This is abominable. They’re _war leaders._

The fires are dying down, darkness bleeding out from the quiet forest, when Clarke absolutely cannot stand it any longer. She stands up. “This has been a really great evening,” she says—what the hell, she thinks, she is absolutely not making a goddamn _speech_ —“And I’ve been glad to meet so many of you. But I have to go check on”—whoever the hell their wounded party is this week, god, what the _hell_. “so—good night.”

And then Bellamy is standing too, slowly unfolding himself from the ground and standing under the bright stars like he always does, like a soldier. Like a king too young for the weight of his crown. “As my princess goes, so goes my kingdom,” he says. She feels it like a jolt— _his_ princess. She hopes no one else noticed. She hopes she’s not as bright as she feels.

Meanwhile everyone else slowly stands and stretches, begins drifting back to their posts and their cots. As usual, no one could imagine arguing with him.

No one but Clarke.

But then, she’s imagining a lot of things, standing still in the cold night, seeing him with his hands clasped behind him, seeing him regard her with the firelight flickering across his familiar, unfathomable face. He raises his eyebrows at her and tilts his head.

Clarke shakes her head and breathes once, deep, steadying her hands at her sides. She marches over to him, and when she reaches him and doesn’t slow, he pivots to match her stride. They are close as anything, as they’ve always been— and yet he feels impossibly far, the air between them heavy.

“Hey,” she says, finally.

“Hi,” Bellamy says. His arm brushes hers. She shivers.

“That was a good night,” Clarke says again, glancing up at him. He’s gazing sidelong down at her with a funny look on his face. She flexes her hands and charges onward. “We should— do it again. Sometime.”

He stops walking. “Really,” he says slowly.

“Yes,” she says, turning to face him as he turns towards her, their bodies moving together like mirrors. Her chest is aching from the weight of her heart, but she doesn’t back away. It’s only Bellamy.

It’s Bellamy.

Clarke reaches out with one hand, not very far after all, and slides her fingers into his hand, snags her fingertips against his and tugs a little. He looks down at their hands like he’s not sure whose they are. He tugs back. He looks up at her then, something sparking bright in his eyes, a grin blooming across his face.

“Really,” she says.  


End file.
